RE: SV: Schema help

> For what it's worth, I think those of us who are active in 
> designing the 
> schema language are well aware of the good reasons why co-occurrence 
> constraints are important, and that XML Schema 1.0 does not provide 
> adequate support for them.   Our ability to do better in 
> future versions 
> of the Schema language, and to have improvements out in a 
> timely manner, 
> will depend to a significant extent on the degree to which 
> W3C members contribute the staffing needed in the workgroup to do the 
> necessary design and specification.

I think a number of working groups are struggling with similar resource
problems.

Perhaps it's time to try a different model, one based more on open email
discussion. There are lots of small companies, especially outside the US*,
who simply cannot afford the time and international travel needed to attend
WG meetings regularly (or indeed the costs of joining W3C), but who still
have ideas to contribute. As an experiment, try setting up an email-based
group tasked to develop a design for co-occurrence constraints as an
enhancement to XML Schema. The result would still have to be approved and
integrated by the WG using its conventional processes, but there's no reason
why the design work shouldn't be done in a different forum.

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/

* I don't know what the situation is on the Schema WG. On the XSL and XQuery
WGs, 80-90% of the meetings are held in North America, and most members from
outside North America have gradually dropped out. In an electronic age,
there must be a more economical and more inclusive way of doing business.

Received on Thursday, 17 November 2005 14:44:55 UTC